Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: presidio9

I do not believe in polls. They are the LEAST valid and reliable of all the ways to get information/truth from people.


5 posted on 01/11/2016 1:07:00 PM PST by cloudmountain
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies ]


To: cloudmountain

Kim Davis changed her party affiliation. I expect many more like her to follow. In fact, if Trump wins it will be because of white Democrat voters who cross the aisle because their party no longer represents their views.


12 posted on 01/11/2016 1:13:51 PM PST by punknpuss
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies ]

To: cloudmountain
If a poll is done correctly, it can be accurate. The problem is that it is costly and difficult to get it right. Since most people no longer have land lines, the only way you can survey them is to put boots on the ground. In the past we would randomly select phone numbers to get a random sample. Now it is much more difficult to get a random sample thanks to cell phones. Extensive demographic data must be used now to get a good random sample. Further, you just can't hire just anyone to do the polling, and they have to be trained not to introduce bias into the sample. The purpose of a poll is to find the truth, otherwise it is garbage.

To understand how difficult polling can be, consider what happened when the exit poll in 2000 that claimed that Al Gore would beat Bush. I knew the poll was a push poll immediately, its purpose was to influence the election. I know this because they called the race over before noon. It is well known that conservatives tend to vote later in the he day than liberals. Thus any accurate exit poll must be done all day. Also the polling company hired young college men, many of them were football players and frat boys. Guess who the surveyed, big surprise mostly young women. Younger women tend to be more liberal then married with children. Also you might want to lie to a big football player asking 'Did you vote for Gore?' if you felt intimated. In the past I hired a bunch of grandmother's to do my polling. The old ladies would talk to anyone, and not many people would lie to a nice old lady. Also the old grandmas were easy to train and reliable in following instructions. The bad news is that even if you are careful in getting a good random sample your poll could be biased because of how the survey is worded. Polling is as much of an art as well as a science. There is good money to be made in polling, but it is a lot of work to do it right.

104 posted on 01/11/2016 3:51:12 PM PST by Do the math (Doug)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 5 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson